Description

In this talk, Mina Fazel highlights how adolescents today access a diverse range of mental health support options beyond traditional healthcare services. While formal care networks—such as medical professionals and mental health services—play a critical role, adolescents also seek support through semiformal and informal networks, including schools, community organisations, peers, family, and digital platforms. These sources of support do not function in isolation but form interconnected networks of care that collectively sustain adolescent mental health. This video emphasises the importance of moving beyond a service-based approach to a network-oriented perspective when addressing adolescent mental healthcare. By exploring how adolescents navigate different levels of support—ranging from structured interventions to informal peer discussions—she provides insight into the synergies and tensions within these networks. She presents anchored analyses that offer a nuanced understanding of how these networks operate for vulnerable groups, highlighting disparities in access and engagement, and emphasising the need to design interventions that account for differing levels of need and support-seeking behaviours. By adopting a network-based framework, Mina Fazel shows how clinicians, educators, and policymakers can better appreciate the landscape of adolescent mental healthcare seeking. Services cannot be designed in isolation; instead, more integrated, accessible, and acceptable mental health support systems can be developed, informed by these findings. This approach acknowledges the realities of adolescent help-seeking patterns and promotes public mental health strategies that improve adolescent mental healthcare provision.

Learning Objectives

A. To understand the concept of networks of care and their role in adolescent mental health support.

B. To understand the potential advantages of adopting a network-based approach rather than viewing services in isolation.

C. To recognize the challenges and disparities faced by vulnerable groups within adolescent care networks.